Video Series Shows Wide-Reaching Impact of Justice System

From those incarcerated to those enforcing incarceration.

It was the middle of the day when Erica Garner got the call that her father, Eric Garner, had stopped breathing. It wasn't until a reporter told her brother that there was video of her father's encounter with police that she learned how he had died.

When Ayana Thomas went to prison, she told her six-year old daughter that she had joined the military. Her daughter, who would see her mother only in her green prison jumpsuit, was none the wiser.

Yusef Salaam was one of five men wrongly accused and imprisoned for raping a white woman in Central Park. When police questioned him, Yusef figured he'd be home before his mother returned because he was innocent. He didn't beat his mother home — he came back seven years later after he was released from prison.

These are just some of the stories people who become entangled with the United States justice system have to tell. An 18-video series from the New Yorker and the Marshall Project shines a spotlight on these stories from people who were formerly incarcerated, former prison guards, former police officers, and families of people who died as a result of the system. The series, "We Are Witnesses," gives a face to news stories and statistics.

But beyond those imprisoned, the series shows how far-reaching the issue really is. From perpetrators to victims, those wrongly accused to those who imprison them, the series shows exactly how the justice system impacts all of us.

“We Are Witnesses" is about the people whose lives are entwined in the system, and the roles they play,” Neil Barsky, the series’ executive producer and creator, said in a statement. “Their stories reveal both a tragic system and the nobility and heroism of the men and women ensnared in its net.”